Apocalyptic Homesteading (Day 674)

Hello Everyone!

Bob does the wing dance, Espresso at night, Upping the caloric intake, Lots of sleep & A cool sighting or two!

I am off to a slow start this morning but at least I awoke on time and was able to get the chickens let out without getting 'attacked' for being late. I may have been a few minutes late though because Bob the rooster did puff out his feathers and strutted towards me before I nudged him away with a stick that I keep near the coop.

Thankfully he just turned away and began his 'wing dance' to show off for the hens before being left behind by them as they walked away. He then quickly dropped his act and ran off after them (doing his comical waddle) to begin the morning foraging around the dog yard.

Alright, I never wrote anything else than the above this morning and now it is just after sunset so I best apply myself here and see what all I can get spelled out in this entry. Having awoken from a very long nap an hour or so before dark I have no worries about growing fatigued... but I made some evening espresso just for good measure!

I have obviously backslid on my 'no coffee at night' rule and although I keep justifying doing so... I also need to reach the point where I cease doing that. The extra 'focus' during the evenings has been nice but when it comes right down to it... I am beginning to think that I do it way more for the pleasure it brings me.

All that said though, it does make me feel like perhaps I am being slightly overstimulated when I need to be winding down for the day... but hey at least I have been able to more or less stay on track with my writing and posting routine! The majority of nights I really do want to just tune everything out, find some way to entertain myself and drift off to sleep in short order.

On a different note. I attempted to eat a large amount of food this morning (basically by having breakfast) but between the extra food that I ate yesterday (when my supplies arrived) and the 'breakfast' all that resulted was me slipping into a food coma! I basically grew thoroughly lethargic as my body attempted to cope with such an influx of food and the resulting 'stupor' lasted much of the day.

Somehow I managed to take a few hikes throughout the day and get my routine chores achieved but beyond that I napped every chance that I could close my eyes for more than a few minutes. The first nap occurred very early on (right after breakfast) and was unintentional because I meant to take an anti-inflammatory but fell asleep before I could do so!

I also did not struggle all that much against the drowsiness to take the medicine because this morning (when I first awoke) a lot of the pain in that leg had subsided and honestly I prefer not to take any pharmaceuticals unless I absolutely have to. Considering how many anti-inflammatories that the body releases while sleeping perhaps all that recent rest (and the rest today) will work to get the muscle healing faster.

My deal with myself was to give it all 'one more day' and if I awake tomorrow and am not convinced it is truly on the mend... then I will do what I have had to do in the past and begin taking a round of anti-inflammatories. As I have said before it just takes a heck of a lot of food (way more than I am accustomed to eating) to prevent ulcers from forming while on the medicine and especially while on it for an extended period of time.

Anyway, something really cool happened earlier today when I was walking near the chicken coop and got startled by the sight of a large snake coming out the door of the coop itself. To be clear I saw it from the corner of my eye and of course any snake movement (or shape) on the periphery of vision should be 'startling' given the inability to make an accurate identification.

Of course I came to an immediate stop and looked to see that it was an Eastern Black Kingsnake... at which point I sighed before getting excited to fetch a phone to take some pictures because I had finally caught it on its way out. It was really beyond exciting because I have been trying to get some pictures of it with good sunlight for months now.

No sooner had all that run through my head than it began to slither away towards the fence... so I had to hurry to get the pictures which is where the 'really cool' thing happened. As I turned away from the coop I once again saw 'snake movement' and although it did not startle me quite as much... it did startle me to see another (almost equally as large) Eastern Black Kingsnake inside the coop!

To backtrack here a good bit to (I think) two springs ago when I first saw my very first snake here just outside that area of the dog yard where the coop is now... I had guessed its size to be around two meters. What I never remarked upon was that later on each time that I saw it I assumed I had been wrong on my initial estimation of its size... but after today I think that I have a better answer.

My initial thought upon realizing that was something akin to: Ha! Of course their are two of them and I bet they are of different sexes! After thinking that I looked around for any more snakes (yup ya never know) and seeing none I went and paced off the size of the snake slowly making its way towards the fence.

Yup it was a wee bit over two meters long so it was probably the one that I saw that first spring that I was in this area. I then gave a closer look at the snake in the coop and it is definitely the one that I see more often and the one with the healthy skin that I mentioned a few entries ago.

There have been several times that I have seen 'a snake' in one of the laying boxes and honestly this whole time I assumed it was a single snake... but now I am really questioning things! One thing that I had thought previously (for months now actually) is how it really seemed like a lot of eggs for one snake to be eating but now I see how even that was a clue that I missed!

As you can imagine I was pretty stoked about the entire encounter and all the realizations associated with it so hopefully the pictures that I took came out okay. I know folks seldom understand the value of having such snakes around but whoa two such large ones like that in a place with lots of pit vipers... I will gladly let them eat all the eggs they want... and hope that they in return go off and lay their own eggs!

Okay, I am going to call this entry 'good enough' and get on with the editing and posting portion of my evening. I hope that everyone is doing well and has a nice day/night.

This is the larger of the two Eastern Black Kingsnakes. As you can see it let me get fairly close to get some pictures!

I love how subtle the markings are on this snake.

This is the other Eastern Black Kingsnake that was in the coop. The markings on it are much more noticeable because I think it recently shed its skin.

Thanks for reading!

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